NCSPA Sustainability steel bridges

New Sustainability Video Compares Corrugated Steel Pipe to Other Materials

Topics: Buried Bridge, News, Sustainability
August 17, 2023

The National Corrugated Steel Pipe Association (NCSPA), member of the Short Span Steel Bridge Alliance (SSSBA), launched a video focused on the sustainability of corrugated steel pipe – commonly used in buried steel bridges.

The American steel industry is the cleanest and most energy efficient of the leading steel industries in the world. The video offers interesting information to support this fact.

Video Contents

The content provided in this video includes, but not limited to:

  • Environmental concerns regarding sustainability (i.e. loss of arable land and climate change).
  • Solutions that can lead to a more sustainable environment.
  • Facts about steel that support its place as a sustainable material and how it measures up to other materials.
  • Information on how corrugated steel pipe specifically is a great sustainable solution for a project.

Steel Bridges and Sustainability

Increasingly, short span bridge owners and designers are emphasizing the importance of sustainability in their bridge projects. The environmental impact associated with building and maintaining our nation’s infrastructure has become and will remain a critical consideration when choosing a material.

Short span steel bridges are sustainable because:

  • Steel is 100 percent recyclable, which means it can be recycled into the same material of the same quality again and again. When you buy steel, you are buying recycled.
  • Steel bridges can last 100 years or more, with minimal maintenance over their long service lives.
  • The high strength of steel permits longer spans, which minimizes disruption to underlying habitats.
  • Steel is highly resistant to extreme natural disasters such as earthquakes.
  • Producing a ton of steel today in the U.S. requires less than half the energy that was needed to produce a ton of steel 40 years ago, resulting in a 50% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.

Learn six additional reasons why steel provides a sustainable bridge solution.